Established in 2000 at Washington and Lee University by a generous endowment from the Class of 1960, the Institute for Honor includes an array of initiatives and specific programs designed to promote the understanding and practice of honor as an indispensable element of society. Its mandate is to provide an educational and resource management framework dedicated to the advocacy of honor as the core value in personal, professional, business, and community relations.
The Institute for Honor held its inaugural weekend symposium in 2002. Recent seminars have addressed such topics as “Sports in America: Playing Fair,” with Jeffrey Toobin; “Moral Authority and the Modern American Presidency,” with Bob Woodward; and “The Clash of Values: Finding Accord in the New World Order,” with Richard Holbrooke. Previous Institute symposia have featured David McCullough, Richard Brookhiser, Roger Mudd ’50, and former W&L President Robert E.R. Huntley ’50, ’57L. In each program, W&L faculty and students are invited to participate in panel and open forum discussions.
This year’s symposium will focus on the question, “What Do We Owe Future Generations?” Keynote speakers include James E. Hansen, noted scientist and environmental conservationist, and William G. Gale, a federal economic policy specialist and economist at the Brookings Institution. 
W&L President Kenneth P. Ruscio ’76 will deliver the opening keynote address. The question invites us to examine the current direction of federal policies on both the economy and the environment as well as the nation’s investment in education at all levels. Issues of honor, fairness, and a shared obligation to the future welfare of our society are fundamental to these deliberations. Ideals inevitably are weighed against practical and practicable considerations, in this case the pressing concerns of resource management, funding sources, and economic viability. Ultimately, questions of personal, civic, and corporate responsibility take hold. In a world of rapid change and diminished national resources, what we owe future generations is a matter of compelling and inescapable immediacy.
The ninth annual Institute for Honor Symposium in 2010 will coincide with the Class of 1960’s 50th Reunion.
